Here's how you can tell if Native Americans have it worse than any other ethnic group.

A. Check out Chief Wahoo, the mascot of the Cleveland Indians.

Now imagine it as black, Latino, Asian, Jewish, Arabic, or any other nationality in the world. How do you think members of that nationality would react?

B. Consider the name "Redskins". As above, apply it to any other, using an equivalent term. How long would it take before the corporate headquarters was stormed?

C. Imagine if this thread was about blacks, Latinos, Asians, Jews, Arabs, or any other nationality. How would it have gone over if the equivalent of any of these were said about them?

D. Imagine a black, Latino, Asian, Jew or Arab wanting to return to his homeland - to see the heritage of his ancestors, to meet the people descended from their common origins, to see the land from which his family came. Now imagine a Native American wanting to do the same. He can't, because you're standing on it.

E. Imagine if you were a Native American. Imagine growing up on a reservation, where your people were herded centuries ago, and living your whole life in probably the most rampant poverty in the nation. Imagine hearing your grandparents tell of when the schoolteachers would beat them with sticks if they displayed their cultural heritage at all, and seeing the faces of the leaders of the people who victimized you for years blasted into the rock wall of your holy land, to great acclaim. Imagine growing up seeing your people depicted in the movies by Italians and Spaniards, and reading all about European heroes and explorers in history class, but hearing names like Massasoit, Chief Joseph, Opchanacanough, Black Elk, Sequoyah, and Mankiller only at home. Imagine living with this every day of your life, watching the grand history of all of your people vanish by inches from the only place on Earth where it exists, and see anyone who stands up to fight for it dismissed as a drunk, an idiot, or a drunken idiot. Now imagine that one of the few sacred cultural symbols you have left is glamorized and propped on the head of a white runway model in a fashion show.

Sure, there are Natives with a giant chip on their shoulder against white people. There are a lot of them. There are also a lot of white people with giant chips on their shoulders against Natives (some of them in this very thread). Who do you think is more justified in having that chip? And regardless, is it fair to color an entire race of people based only on the ones you stumble across in a Flagstaff 7-11?

Last thing, I promise: In rereading what I just wrote, it occurs to me that this post, while true, is also a preachy, depressing, pompous bloviation on my part. Sorry about that. By way of atonement, I offer you this YouTube about Joe Medicine Crow, a war hero and inspiration, in an effort to temper this atrocity of a post. Enjoy.

You obviously put a lot of thought and effort into this post. I feel kinda' bad for not reading it.